


You Want a Revelation

by thetreeswhisper



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Episode: s07e17 Born Again Identity, M/M, Pre-Slash, Season/Series 07 Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-29
Updated: 2012-07-29
Packaged: 2017-11-11 00:54:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/472667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thetreeswhisper/pseuds/thetreeswhisper
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He missed Cas so much, he thought he was going crazy.<br/>And Dean knew, this time, there was no way the angel could come back.  No matter how many times the guy somehow survived, or God brought him back to life... all logic told him that it wouldn't happen this time.<br/>That was, until he stabbed a demon and it rolled down the steps right to Cas' feet.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You Want a Revelation

He missed Cas so much, he thought he was going crazy.

And Dean knew, this time, there was no way the angel could come back.  No matter how many times the guy somehow survived, or God brought him back to life... all logic told him that it wouldn't happen this time.  It was impossible, and besides,  _look at what Cas did._

That's what he told himself, reminded himself.  But it didn't stop him from hoping.   _Desperately_.

That was new.  Dean had seen enough people die, for good, so there wasn't much hope left in him.  He never hoped for anything as strongly as he did now; if Cas never came back, he would die hoping he'd see him in Heaven (or probably Hell).  There was a certainty in his gut that he couldn't shake, a feeling that his hope had some foundation.  But how could it?  What possibility did he see, what sign that he was alive?  And why would he want Cas alive, anyway, when he could still be that evil... not-Cas?  What if he came back and he  _still_  wasn't Cas?  And  _shouldn't all these fears outweigh the single hope?_

But they didn't.  He clung to it, without knowing why.   _Cas_  has  _to come back, because--_

Damn, he couldn't finish that.

There were too many reasons.  "So I can kill him" was one of them, though for some reason "So I can kiss him" was also on the list.

Great, one more thing to add to the mixing pot of confusion in Dean's brain.

He'd had a dream.  He was sitting on his dock, at his lake, fishing - the first time he'd had this dream in over two years. The last time was right before they met Jimmy Novak, when Cas intruded on the scene to give Dean a message.  This time, Cas intruded again, but Dean could tell it was just his own Cas, in his head.  The strange and uncomfortably pressing warmth of grace wasn't there like it was before, even though he heard the flutter of wings (or maybe that sound had always been the trenchcoat, flapping in the wake of flight, he never knew).  At some point, the fishing rod disappeared from his hands as though it had never been there, the warped continuity of dreams making it vague.  Cas put a hand on his shoulder, so he looked up and was swallowed by the sudden rush of the ocean.  Then the ocean receded into blue eyes that didn't diminish any of its vastness, and Dean realized he was standing up.  He noticed an entanglement of arms, a hand coming up to brush its fingers on his cheek, that Cas was invading his personal space far more than he ever had before, and as a result their lips were softly meeting in the middle.

Dean's head was spinning so much it woke him up before the dream even got good.  The dizziness barely even went away as he lay there with his eyes open, taking deep breaths, focusing on not waking Sam.

He had to be going crazy, and he could only blame it on how much he missed Cas.

Sometimes that happens, right?  You lose someone and all of a sudden they look different in your head?  It was like how Dad imagined that he and Mom had a perfect marriage, denied any memories that might have been bad.  Or how at this very moment, Dean was forgetting the grumpy, sarcastic son of a bitch that Bobby often was, or at the very least feeling more endeared to that side of him than he was at the time.  This was the same thing, it had to be.  Now that Cas was gone, Dean was remembering the time they went to a stripper bar instead of the time he swallowed thousands of souls, became a god, and almost destroyed the world.

That was it, that  _had_  to bethe extent of why Dean kept wishing he and Cas had been... more than friends.

_Just_  friends, that's what they were.  There were boundaries, like Cas being an angel and a guy, and Dean being emotionally stunted.  Cas was like family, and at least Dean had a chance to tell him  _that_  before he went supernova.  That's why Cas mattered to him, why there was so much tension between them all the time - family is all about making you tense.  If anyone knew that, Dean did.  So... if his thoughts were drifting further in the direction of affection, well... it was a side effect of him being missing.  There was a Cas-shaped hole that kept getting bigger, making Dean's brain think it needed more than friendship and protectiveness and family to fill it back up.

His brain was just confused, his mixed up feelings were delusions.  He'd never had them before, when he was around Cas, so if they were only starting now, they couldn't be real.  He buried them, told himself it was all just psychological bullshit.

That was, until he stabbed a demon and it rolled down the steps right to Cas' feet.

He denied what he was seeing.  That couldn't be real, either.  No way was Castiel staring up at him, his gaze crashing into him like waves.  Those eyes weren't really there, that face and dark hair just a weird waking vision he was having just to prove how truly insane he'd become.

"Who was that?"

Dean barely heard the question over the pounding of blood in his head.  It was weird how it sped up when he stopped breathing.  You'd think it'd just stop too.

Cas was still staring at him.  He felt dizzy but he hadn't woken up yet.  He could still feel the knife in his hand, hot from the sparks of a demon dying on it.  It was too real to be a dream, but not enough to be reality.

He realized his mouth was dry when he finally sucked in some air, his lungs burning.  Based on that, he was probably awake.  That didn't prove it was real, though.

Something was off.  Cas came up the steps with furrowed brows and looked again from Dean to the man lying on the ground, asking, "What did it do?"

Dean gulped.  He had to make himself speak, but he wasn't sure if he could.  In an attempt to force out anything at all, he stuttered, "H-he was... uh..."  Part of his brain chided,  _Shining moment there, Winchester, real nice,_  while another part whimpered, ... _Cas?_   In a moment of brilliance or luck, he stuck his thumb toward the window and managed, "Someone tied up--"

Cas turned toward it and saw the woman bound to a chair, immediately hurrying to the door to throw it open and rush to her side.  Dean felt a twinge in his gut and followed into the house, which hardly showed signs of anyone other than Daphne Allen living there, unless the Buddha head and new age-y decor were Cas' choice.  Which... was this even Cas?  Was he human?

"Did that creature hurt you?" he questioned the woman tenderly, in contrast with the urgent way he untied her bonds.

"I'm okay," she breathed.  As soon as her arms were free, their hands grasped each other's and she stood up.  "Emmanuel, they were looking for you."

"It's okay."

_So, Cas... is Emmanuel... and Emmanuel... is Cas_ , Dean's brain sluggishly put together.  It...  _seriously, what the hell is going on?!_

Okay, he swallowed and stared, they were holding hands.  That wasn't weird, 'cause this wasn't exactly Cas.

Her free hand touched... uh,  _Emmanuel's_  cheek and ran down the zipper of his kind-of-frumpy-looking sweater, and he turned toward Dean.  Fingers still wrapped around her wrist, he took three steps across the room and stated,  "I'm Emmanuel."

He held out his hand, and Dean almost forgot that it meant he should shake it as though this were a normal greeting for a normal stranger.  Realizing how stupid he looked with his mouth opening and closing silently while he looked back and forth between Cas' hand and his face, blinking too frequently, he took the hand he was offered.  "Dean.  I'm... Dean."

"Thank you for protecting my wife," Emmanuel intoned with pure gratitude.

Dean exhaled and blamed the clenching in his chest on that.  Still blinking, sounding even more stupid, all he could say was, "Your wife?  Right..."

_God, I'm such an idiot_ , he thought to himself.   _I can't be jealous, I just can't.  I'm going fucking crazy._

Emmanuel looked into Daphne's eyes and recalled, "I saw his face..." then looked intently at Dean, "... his real face."

"He was a demon," he provided.  It was seeming less and less likely that the old Cas was here after all, and Dean couldn't believe how badly he wished he was, how much he wanted him, betrayal aside.  It was a miracle that he could even speak.

Lowering his eyes to the floor, Emmanuel's voice got hushed, disbelieving.  "A demon walked the earth."

Dean frowned.  "De _mons_.  Whackloads of 'em, you don't know 'bout...?"  The man who looked like Cas squinted at Dean, completely destroying his ability to continue his sentence.  There was that clenching pain in his chest again, a catching in this throat, inexplicable reactions to the fact that those freakin' blue eyes were burrowing right into him.  Like they were reading his mind, seeing his soul...  _again_. Fuck, it never hit him so hard that Cas had witnessed his bare naked soul in Hell, and still pulled him out, sacrificed everything for him.  No wonder he always saw right through Dean - what really  _was_  a wonder was why he didn't throw Dean back in the pit all those times he deserved it.

There was a look in the man's eyes like Dean was itching a spot on his memory, that glint on the edge of recognition.  And for some reason the fact that his mouth was slightly open was making Dean want to glance at that too, eyes moving up and down between eyes and lips involuntarily.  He wouldn't admit it, but he hadn't had only one dream about Cas and his mouth.

He tried to avoid wishing for things, since he always wished for things he couldn't have.

"You saw the demon's true face," Daphne cut in, reminding Dean that  _fuck, this guy has a wife and he isn't even Cas, not really_.  "Emmanuel has... very special gifts."

Dean glanced at her long enough to remind himself to take a deep breath, but he was soon staring at Cas... or Emmanuel... or whatever again.  "Yeah, I've--I've heard that, how 'bout, uh... Emmanuel."  Dean nodded, the man tightening his lips, flicking his eyes up at Dean momentarily with an expression almost like self-doubt.  "That you can heal people up."

"I seem to be able to help to a certain degree," he admitted.  He looked back up with more confidence and inquired, "What's your issue?"

_God, do I have a ton of fucking issues, Cas,_  Dean wanted to say.   _First off, you.  How it's impossible for you to even be here.  To be so like Cas without being him at all.  To make me question whether this actually affects my sexual orientation.  To spin my head around with just a look._

Instead he answered, "My brother."

Before he knew it, he was explaining where his brother was being kept, Daphne was kissing Emmanuel on the cheek, and they were getting in the stupid, beat-up old car that wasn't the Impala.  The area's only half-decent FM station played all the worst oldies songs for a while, until they were far enough away that it was just static.  By then it was dark and raining, and Dean had calmed the pounding of his heart just a little, though he still couldn't wrap his head around the fact that somebody who might be Cas was sitting there in the passenger seat, doing all the little things that were just like Cas.

The way he sat with his hands resting on top of his knees, perfectly still except for his head turning to look out the window, sometimes to the front and sometimes to the side.  Dean was reminded that the trenchcoat was in the trunk.  It was right there, and he could pull over and get it out and the guy could have no clue what was going on.   _Or_  it could trigger his memories, and Dean could have Cas back even though running into Dean didn't seem to...

He was afraid that the longer he was with Cas, the more he'd gradually remember everything.  What if it tore Cas apart?  What would it do to him?  Dean hated being unsure, and he didn't want to risk it.

He'd have to find out more first.

There was really only one thing he knew about Emmanuel, so he decided to ask about that to start off.  "So, Daphne... that, uh, your wife?"

_Oh god, such an obvious fishing line.  What am I even doing?_

He nodded, didn't even seem to notice.  "She found me and cared for me."  His voice went up at the end of his sentence; Dean knew there was more to this tale.

"Meaning?"

"Oh, it's a... strange story.  You may not like it," Emmanuel tried to deter, but there was no fucking way.

Dean wanted to know how Cas got out of that reservoir more than a lot of things, and maybe he wouldn't remember that part, but Dean would take any part of the story he could get.  "Believe me, I will."

The other man gave it a pause, glancing at Dean ( _deciding whether or not to trust me - gee, imagine that_ ), then detailed, "A few months ago, she was hiking by the river and I wandered into her path, drenched, and confused, and... unclothed.  I had no memory.  She said... God wanted her to find me."

This pause was fatter than all the others.

So God was most likely involved.  Again.

If God could forgive Cas for what he did, couldn't Dean?

"So who named you 'Emmanuel'?" he asked, keeping his thoughts from dragging him into painfully guilty territory.

"Bouncing baby names dot com."

That had to be the silliest-sounding thing he'd heard in Cas' voice.  Dean turned his head slowly and raised his eyebrows, but the expression was lost on Emmanuel, so he rolled his eyes.  "Well, it's workin' for you.  Must be weird, not knowin' who you are."

"Well, it's my life.  It's a good life."  He was earnest, he was truly content.  The truth settled like a pit in Dean's stomach, that bringing Emmanuel back to Daphne after this was all over and letting him live out a decent life was the best choice.  It didn't matter what either of them deserved, what either of them had done, Dean knew that the  _right_  thing would be to let Cas go.

A selfish part of him really didn't want to.  It wanted to test him, bring Cas back at whatever the cost.  That was why he challenged, "Yeah, what if you were some kind of, I don't know... bad guy."

"I... don't feel like a bad person," Cas gave another heartfelt statement.

_No.  You aren't.  And you never could be._

Dean nodded, shrugged, tried to shake off something he couldn't describe.  He rummaged through his shrunken collection of cassette tapes, now kept in his duffel, to pull out the only Metallica album he kept.  "Enter Sandman" came blasting through the speakers and Dean turned it down slightly for Cas' sake, though the man only tilted his head at the sound and listened very closely.

Dean belatedly realized it was the tape he played with Cas riding shotgun back in 2009, and he wondered whether it would do anything to bring back the memories.  He felt like he was riding on the edge of a cliff on a motorcycle that was going to turn one way or the other as soon as the switch was flipped.  Cas' consciousness could return with a smooth glide onto more dirt road, or go flying off the edge.  And for some reason, either way, Dean greedily wanted Cas back.  This Emmanuel guy was kind of boring.

But it was clear after a few songs and twenty more miles of road that Metallica wasn't going to do the trick, besides giving him better taste in music.  Dean remembered Cas being pretty passive about it before, but he was tapping his foot now, and Dean felt a surge of pride.

Eventually the tape ended without anyone noticing, and after realizing there had been another hour of silence, Dean half-expected Emmanuel to be asleep or something.  When he turned to look, he was still sitting exactly the same way, still gazing out the window.  Clearly, he still had some vestiges of angel in him.  He healed people, he sat ridiculously still, his presence itched like wind coming off the beach with tiny grains of sand caught in it.

It wasn't exactly a short drive.  Dean only had three 45-minute tapes, and there were 19 hours of road between Colorado and northern Indiana.

Maybe Emmanuel noticed his restlessness, because he started the next conversation. 

"So your brother...?"

"Sam," Dean filled in.

"Sam.  What's his diagnosis?"  The question was methodical, sensitive, practiced.

Dean cleared his throat.  Where the fuck to begin?  "Well, it's not exactly medical..."

Emmanuel gave a small, serious nod.  "That should be fine. I can cure illness of a spiritual origin."

"Spiritual?" Dean repeated, not exactly as a question.  They half-exchanged glances, the timing not quite right, but there seemed to be another affirmative from the other man.  "Okay."

So now how to explain it all?  Dean had been flitting back and forth between the ideas of telling Cas who he is or keeping it a secret for the past two hours, and he felt himself leaning toward the latter at the moment, unsure why.  It felt like he was keeping him safe that way. Keeping him safe was all Dean ever wanted.  He hesitated, "... Someone did this to him."

Cas turned his head and looked at Dean in a terribly familiar way.   _No, that's Emmanuel, Cas isn't home right now, even when he acts like he is._   The reminder was painful, especially when the man squinted at him the tiniest bit before moving his gaze away from his face and he noted, "You're angry."

"Well, yeah.  Dude broke my brother's head," Dean lashed reactively, trying to ignore the weird sense of deja vu that he couldn't pin down.  The feeling passed.

The guy was still staring.  He was still Cas in too many ways.  "He betrayed you, this dude--"  _how could he possibly guess_  "--He was your friend?"

_Mm, Friend?  Yeah.  Maybe family, or both.  Someone fucking special, whatever he was._ Dean looked down at the hands resting on the other man's knees, the ones that pulled him out of hell and countless other deaths, that rested on his shoulder when he needed reassurance... for a time.  All that changed.

Who knew who or what drove Cas to do what he did - Dean felt guilty all the same.  He couldn't hold onto a good thing when he had it, stupid fucking failure that he was.  He dragged his head to the left, looked the other way and tried to agree that  _Cas_  betrayed  _him._ It was only partly true; the facts were bitter.  "Yeah, well, he's gone."

"Did you kill him?"

Dean jerked his head to look over at the man again, just at the sheer suddenness of the question.

"I sense that you kill a lot of people."

_Dammit, don't remind me._   And he wondered if he  _had_  killed Cas, if this was it, there were no locked memories, Cas wasn't coming back.  And how utterly fucking lost he would be if that were the case.

"Honestly, I-I-I don't know if he's dead," he managed with a shaky breath.  No matter how solid the body in the seat next to him was, it couldn't prove a thing: and wasn't that just the worst, not knowing?  "I just know that this--" he shook his head,  _this what?_  "--whole thing couldn't be messier.  You know, I used to be able to just shake this stuff off.  Y'know, whatever it was--" he shrugged "--It might take me some time, but... I always could.  What  _Cas_  did..."   _'Cause this guy ain't Cas, this is some dude who doesn't know what could hit him._   "...I just can't - I don't know why."

"Well, it doesn't matter why."

"Of course it matters!" he argued, pointlessly.

Those blue eyes bored right into him.  "No, you're not a machine, Dean.  You're human."

_Yeah, and you're not.  You almost were... but I'm not gonna think about that._

Emmanuel smiled ruefully.  "Your friend's name was Cas? That's an odd name."

This conversation just kept getting weirder.  Talking about Cas to his spitting image was kinda creepy, so Dean switched tapes to "Led Zeppelin II," the most fucking awesome album ever made.  If anything could distract him, this was it.

The silence with Emmanuel eventually relaxed, finally a point of calm around Dean's hectically panicking head (so maybe the distraction wasn't perfect).  He was raised to predict, avoid, or fix disaster scenarios, how could he stop now?  Every possible "what if" ran through his head; what would result from telling Cas, not telling Cas, Cas finding out on his own, Cas not being Cas at all?  All he could do was protect Emmanuel and hope he didn't explode.  Perfect recipe for a big, steaming pot of worry.

One thing did keep nagging him consistently.  That gut feeling, that hope he'd kept these past few months... was it for this?  Just finding Emmanuel?  Or was there more?

Ten hours, two stops for gas, one nap, two cups of burnt black coffee, three cheap tacos, six bad radio stations, and four spaced-out repeats of "Led Zeppelin II" later, the sun was coming back up and Dean pulled into another convenience store.

"Oh, hey, hey.  Just, uh, sit tight.  I'll be right out, okay?" he announced to Emmanuel, who nodded and quietly complied.

He checked his phone once inside, thinking,  _Please, please, please._ But there were no calls, no messages, not yet.  Fuck, not to mention the hospital needed to call him any minute about Sam, to keep Dean updated.

The door opened behind him and some rather hasty footsteps approached him.  Dean looked up into the security mirror and saw he had just enough time to pull the knife out of his pocket and gank the sulfur-smelling bastard.  But... not before he was thrown back against the wall so he dropped his phone and the screen was smashed in.   _Fucking great._

"Oh, come on," he growled, frustrated enough to talk to nobody in particular.

Pocketing it and stepping over the body to go in the other aisle, two more demons confronted him.   _Son of a bitch,_  he thought and sighed heavily, then lunged at them.

Outnumbered, he was disarmed and thrown into some wall-suspended shelves which felt fucking awesome, thanks.  He groaned at that nice, sharp pain in his lower back while trying to stand back up for the millionth time in his life when demon number two went all glowy-eyed and orange with hellfire, the tip of a knife just visible coming through his sternum.

_What?!  Who...?!_

Demon number one got scared out of his pants, black smoke flying away before anybody could kill it, too.

There was only one answer for what just happened.  "Huh," he grunted, making a second attempt to get to his feet, "Emmanuel, you son of a bitch."

The black-eyed sucker with a brand new hole in his chest finished being sparkly and collapsed, revealing the one and only--

_Meg_.

"Emmanuel.  Yeah, not so much."

_This does not bode well._

She was holding the bloody knife, looking as cocky as ever.  He finally pulled himself up, bones creaking more and more every day, and looked her over in disbelief that she'd made it this far in... life.  "Meg?"

"Dean, Dean, Dean," she smirked.  "You got some 'splainin' to do."

This was a bad plan.

But he thought of it fast, and the standards were lower in emergencies.  He peered out the window to check if anyone noticed the fight, broken glass and shelves, and big cloud of black smoke screaming away, but apparently people were oblivious as ever and the parking lot was empty.

He let Meg stew in some silence while he flipped the front sign to "closed" and shut the blinds, but as soon as he turned around she drawled, "Rumors are really starting to fly about this Emmanuel fellow.  My curiosity sure got revved up."

"Just tell me what you want, Meg," he grumbled.

She pretty much just plowed right on, "Imagine my surprise when I track him down, and he's snuggled up with  _you._   And he's the spitting image of poor, dead Castiel."  It didn't seem possible for his frown to deepen at this point, but it did.  "So, Dean, what's poor, dead Castiel doing in that junker out there?"

"Christmas caroling," he spat.   _Maybe he'll sing in his angel voice and it'll finally fucking kill you._

"Fun.  But how's he alive?  Last I heard, he played God, went poof."

He nodded derisively, thinking,  _Yeah, and it was a walk in the park, thanks for bringing that up_.  "I don't know.  And neither does he, so you gotta keep it shut," he commanded, saying the last with a warning right in her face as he walked past her to get to the potato chips.

She turned on the spot, following him with her eyes.  "Oh, I do?"

That bitch was gonna get it.  He halted, pivoted mid-step, leaned forward and clued her in, "He doesn't know he's Cas."

"I know.  I've been watching you for hours."   _Ok, creepy.  Friggin' demons._   He pulled his shoulders back and wondered,  _What else does she know?_ She kept talking, "So here's the deal.  You might remember Crowley and me were  _frosty_  back in the day?  Well, times haven't changed."

"Good," he growled.

"That hurts my feelings.  I've been good to you, Dean."

His eyebrows were knitted so hard a sweater could have popped out.  He was trying to tell if she was joking, and it didn't look like it, which then sent those brows straight through the roof as he retorted, "No, you've been good to  _you_ , sweetheart."

Dean turned and started pocketing M&M's while she tried to keep his attention.  "Look.  Right now, rumors of this wandering healer are strictly low-level.  But body count's getting high enough to change that.  Folks start poking, they sniff angel dust."

Maybe she was getting to a point.  He faced his back to her and continued down the aisle to avoid showing it, going for the power bars.  "Yeah, then they start fallin' all over each other tryin' to tell Crowley."

"Now picture Crowley with his hands on harmless little amnesia-Cas."   _No, thank you._   "Don't get me wrong.  I'm gonna burn that smarmy dick - my time's coming.  But right about now, my army-of-one situation is not cutting it.  It's cold out here, there's a price on my ass, and I need friends."

Well, here was Meg, helpless as ever.  Dean figured that'd be the case, and he'd had a feeling this was where their whole conversation was heading from the get-go.  It wasn't even a surprise anymore that the fucking cockroach kept coming back.

And hell, he'd been in the very same shoes she was wearing now.  He always needed friends 'cause his kept dying.

"Yeah.  I get that.  But I ain't it."  Dean headed for the door, but didn't really expect to get all the way there.

"That's where you're wrong, Dean.  'Cause I'm here to help you, and that makes us friends."

And cue the stop-and-turn.  "Help, huh?  You mean see if you can't turn harmless little Cas out there in to an angel-sized weapon?"  It didn't hurt to test her, see what she really wanted.

"Like you're taking him  _caroling_."

_Fine.  But at least I have his well-fucking-being in mind._ You  _don't give a crap about him._

"And by the way, you really want to keep going with no backup?"  She glanced over her shoulder at the demon she killed, like she was justifying her stupid self-righteousness.  "Hey, I don't trust you, either.  But I could really use Emmanuel.  And he trusts you.  So for now, it's in everyone's best interests to hold hands and cross the street together, 'kay?"

_She could "really use Emmanuel"?_ He narrowed his eyes at those words, and doubted her "best interests."  She was a demon; you'd  _think_  they'd stop working with those sons of bitches after all these years.

He stared her in the face, leaning in.  "We go straight to Sam.  No detours."

"Love it."

God, this was such a bad plan.

Holding up a finger to stop her before she could step all the way around him to the front door, he pronounced, "And one more thing:  _my_  knife."

She grudgingly lifted it toward his open hand, but he had to yank it from her fingers.

As he was cleaning the blood from the blade, she took two steps past him and teased, "You sure we wouldn't be safer traveling with a full-throttle angel?  I could jog his memory."

Her smirk was far too unsettling.  Dean only scowled at her and strode out the door while she called after, "Kidding!  We wouldn't want to upset the poor guy."

They walked back to the car.  It was then that Dean realized what that meant, and he instantly dreaded the next several hours with Meg in the backseat.

Cas was standing outside the car, leaning against the side, but the moment he looked over he rose and panicked. "Her face!  She's one of--"

"It's okay, we come in different flavors," Meg cut in.

Dean almost forgot that Cas--fuck, Emmanuel, he had to remind himself again--would be able to tell she was a demon.  Now he had to get him on board with this really, really bad plan, and say something he didn't think he wanted to be true.  "She's, uh... a friend."

"Meg," she introduced herself.  "Just here for moral support.  I mean, after all, we go way back."

_If she tells him, so help me God--_

"Dean and me!  Just met you, of course."  Emmanuel still looked confused, especially as she got right up in his personal space, smirking and running her eyes over him.  Dean felt violated just watching.  "But I think we're gonna be good friends, too," she oiled.

The man frowned, appearing disgusted and afraid that she was going to crawl all over him any second, and Dean felt equally disgruntled about her demeanor.  This was not going to help resolve the qualms they were all having with this partnership.

"All right, can we go?" he barked.  More than anything, he just wanted Meg to stop the eye-rapey creep show.  It really made him cringe how much it reminded him of the time Cas learned from the "pizza man."

"Yes... please," Emmanuel agreed, and shuffled away from Meg as quickly as possible.

He went back over to the passenger side while she climbed through the driver's door and into the backseat.  Soon the grumbly old scrapbasket of a car was back on the road, and the world's weirdest trio set off together.

A human, an angel, and a demon walk into a bar...

Dean had to congratulate himself on making the absolute. Worst. Plan. Ever.

He let the other man play with the radio, but Meg complained about the music on every station he chose, eventually driving him to give up and turn it off.  Thus began: the silence.

It dragged on, and on... and on.

Yep.  Worst plan.

It took two hours before anyone had the nerve to speak up, and he'd been restless for a good hour and a half leading up to it.  Emmanuel was the one who finally sliced through the thick, quiet air: "This silence is very uncomfortable, is there something I should know?"

He looked at Dean, but Meg was the one to reply first since all Dean could do was open and close his mouth soundlessly.  "I don't know," she baited, "Dean?"

_There's a lot of things you should know, Cas.  A lot._ But Dean shook his head.  He wasn't gonna let Meg subtly jab him with that fact any longer.  "No," he denied, turning it back on the demon bitch, "Meg has that effect.  Awkward, you know?"

"That must be difficult for you," he consoled, regarding her apologetically.  That was just like Cas, taking everything seriously.  It used to make Dean laugh, amused by Cas' utter cluelessness; now it just reminded him how much he missed it.

The only benefit Dean got out of it was the contrite expression on Meg's face.  "Dean's making a joke, Emmanuel," she informed him, eyeing Dean irritably.

Realization hit him slowly, and there was a long pause before he said, "Oh."  Then he forced a smile and a huff of laughter that were so belated it was ridiculous.  Dean's head did a slow turn to gaze at the man incredulously, but all it did was make Dean miserable that sitting next to him was a guy who was an inch away from actually being Cas... but wasn't quite.

If his heart kept speeding up it was gonna go into cardiac arrest, and he couldn't have that while he was behind the wheel.  He needed another distraction.  This time it was his third tape, AC DC's "Highway to Hell."

So it was probably the dumbest thing he kept, and "Back in Black" was a better album overall, but he couldn't help himself.  And the humor factor if it were played for his current road trip companions would be priceless.  As soon as the first chord of the first track hit the speakers, Meg almost died.  She fell back on the bench and cried, "Make it stop!"

"Suck it up," he yelled back.

"Yeah, screw you.  How many demons tortured  _you_  with this one for your first eight hundred years?"

He glanced at her in the rear view mirror.  "Really?  Why'd they gotta ruin a perfectly good song?"  Okay, so maybe Dean hadn't been able to listen to it either, for all of 2007 until about 2009 when he finally got over himself and the fact that yes, he went to Hell.

She just groaned and plugged her ears.

The rest of the album didn't seem to bother her at all, but literally every song was about sex, and it was the only thing they were listening to.  As far as awkward levels, it was like the great and terrible silence again, only this time it was filled with dirty talk coming through a megaphone.

Emmanuel cleared his throat after the the fourth song, "Touch Too Much," but Dean didn't put a stop to it.  If it was gonna be uncomfortable, it was at least gonna be loud.

Naturally, when the album was over, they still had three and a half hours before Indiana.

Dean fiddled with the radio, landing on a bad country station.  Meg threw her hands in the air in surrender, and Emmanuel stared out the window like he could kill something, but no one said a word.

After two songs, it was time to turn on the Metallica.  The man next to Dean visibly relaxed at the sound of it, and Meg didn't even bother pretending she hated all music, so it was an all-around success.  It got put on repeat until the end of the trip.

They arrived just after dark, parking in the lot on a hill looking down at the emergency vehicle entrance.  There were a few people surrounding the door, but they didn't seem like much at first glance.

Of course, as soon as Dean's passengers got out and stood in front of the car to take a peek, that was proven wrong.

"Oh, gracious," Emmanuel swore.

Dean raised his binoculars to check out the scene, and still saw just a gaggle of people, including one guy in a wheelchair.

"Damn it.  Demons," Meg griped in turn.

_This might not be good_.  "All of them?"

"No grass growing under  _your_  feet," she prodded.

Emmanuel inquired, "How many of those knives do you have?"

"Just the one," Dean answered grimly.

"Well, then, forgive me, but what do we do?" he enunciated, his voice low.   _Seriously, is this really the time to ponder Cas' deep... okay, maybe-slightly-sexy voice?  Really?_

"Yeah, Dean," Meg gibed, "Got any other ideas how we could blast through that?"

She could have pierced Dean to death with her stare, and Cas was fixing on him by default, confused.   _Emmanuel, dammit, Emmanuel_  probably sensed her obvious hinting and wanted to understand, but he just couldn't.  And Dean couldn't do it.  He couldn't risk what might happen to Cas.  He certainly couldn't be the one to tell him everything.

He gave the man a nod, saying, "Excuse us.  Meg?"

She rolled her eyes and mumbled, "Oh, for the love of..." but she followed him to a spot several meters away anyway.

" _Sam's_  in there," she turned on him the moment they got there, trying to hit his weak spot.  Dean damn well knew Sam was not okay, he hadn't stopped thinking about it.  She paused before she continued, "I know you're enjoying the double dip with your old pal, but--"

"You think it's that cut and dry?  Really?"  She raised an eyebrow at him, but it went right back down when Dean vocalized the fears he'd let run amok in his head for too long and reminded her, " _You know what he did._   And you want to tell him and just hope that he takes it in stride?  He could snap.  He could... disappear.  Who knows?"

"I gather we know each other."

Dean spun around at Cas' voice and his heart stopped.   _He's not supposed to find out.  He's going to find out.  He's not going to be happy._

Meg replied, "Just a dollop."

"You can tell me - I-I'll be fine," he nervously tried to reassure Dean.

"How do you know?" he challenged.  Cas narrowed his eyes, inquisitive... he obviously  _didn't_  know.  He  _couldn't_  know, because he couldn't know what he'd done.  If Dean knew Cas as well as he thought he did, he would  _not_  be fine when he found out.  "You just met yourself.  I've known you for years."

"You're an angel," she cut in.

_Goddammit, Meg._

Now Emmanuel looked just plain baffled.  "I'm... sorry?  Is that a flirtation?"

Dean's brain just went,  _Uh..._ This was all hitting too close to home, flashing back to the time Meg helped them hunt down Crowley and she looked at Cas like a dog who'd found a bone.  And she was gonna chew it or so help her.  Then they stuck their tongues down each other's throats and Dean hadn't known yet why it felt like a stab in the chest.

Meanwhile, she was still carrying this conversation: "No, it's a species.  A very powerful one."

He looked curious at that.

"She's not lyin'," Dean admitted.  "Okay?  That's why you heal people.  You don't eat.  I'm sure there's more," he guessed.

Something was still confounding the man, the way his brows were drawn together.  "Why wouldn't you tell me?  Being an angel - it sounds pleasant."

"It's not, trust me.  It's bloody, it's corrupt.  It's not pleasant."  He winced at his own words, how harsh they sounded once he said them.  But, if there was one truth in the world, it was that angels are dicks.   _And Cas was the exception to the rule,_  his traitorous mind thought for him.

"He would know," Meg added, "You used to fight together.  Bestest friends, actually."

_I am gonna bitchslap her so hard..._

"We're... friends?" Emmanuel muttered.  Dean returned his gaze, feeling a gulp of air hitch in his throat.  Emmanuel took a deep breath that made his shoulders lift up and exhaled, "Am I Cas?"  Dean froze.  Cas sighed again, "I-I had no idea.  I don't remember you.  I'm sorry."

His eyes were flitting all around the ground by his feet, barely risking glances up at Dean who just wanted one freakin' look in the face so he could see those blue irises and tell if Cas was in there or not.

"Look.  You got the juice.  You can smite every demon in that lot," Meg apprised him.

_Doesn't mean he should._

The man left one more glance with Dean before revolving to look down at the enemies, uncertain.  "But I don't remember how," he countered.

"It's in there," Dean encouraged, coming up to stand at his shoulder.  "I'm sure it's just like ridin' a bike."

He swiveled his head and peered at him.  "I don't know how to do that, either."

_God, pure fucking Cas._   This guy was proving to be more and more like him every second, and it was getting harder and harder to remember to call him Emmanuel.  Dean noticed when he slipped: it happened a lot.

And he had to turn away, take a deep breath, blink, anything to stop looking into those eyes like the fucking sea.  'Cause it was just a sea of sorrow and killer riptides.  It was gonna pull him down and tear him to shreds if he swam out there - he couldn't take the risk.

He didn't want Cas to take the risk, either.  It went against every bone in his body to let him.

Looking back up, he found the other man was already staring, but his gaze was quickly torn away and the man murmured,  "All right, I'll try."  And he headed down the hill.

There were two possible outcomes, neither of them good: one, he walked up and couldn't smite the demons so they kidnapped him and took him to Crowley; two, he  _could_ smite them but it turned him into a nuclear bomb of angel angst.

"This ain't gonna go well."

"I don't know," Meg goaded, raising an eyebrow, "I believe in the little tree topper."

He chose, with great difficulty, not to respond.  A bad joke like that didn't deserve the attention.  No matter that he'd spent a couple Christmases himself wondering if he could convince the dude with wings to pretend to be an ornament.

Cas, or Emmanuel--whoever he was now, marched up to the demons with a heavy dose of trepidation.  One of the possessed guards turned and said something, but he was out of earshot from where Dean was standing.  Then the not-so-decorative angel grabbed the front of his jacket, pressed a palm to his forehead, and burned the evil right out.

The doctor and the formerly wheelchair-ridden patient tried to team up on him, but he gripped a hand to each of their faces and they were likewise demolished.

"That's my boy," Meg drawled.

_He isn't yours, bitch._

The last demon tried to run, but Cas teleported in front of him, pausing to say something then sending it's crooked soul straight to oblivion.

... Well, he obviously still had the mojo.   _But who knows what's gonna turn around now, maybe something farther from Cas than ever._   Yet that glimmer of hope betrayed Dean, and as he treaded down to meet him he felt a twinge that...  _what if it was actually Cas?  What if he was okay?  What if a good thing happened, just this once?_

Dean didn't want to hold onto hope, 'cause it usually disappointed him.

He and Meg reached a spot several feet away, giving him room.  He hadn't moved since he iced the last hell bitch, and they weren't sure what that meant.

"That was beautiful, Clarence," she praised.  Damn her, using that fucking nickname she shouldn't have been allowed to make in the first place.

Dean was a little more cautious.  Voice high and wary, he tried, "Cas?"

Those shoulders were in no way stress-free as he took a few tight breaths, and with equal stiffness in his voice the angel replied, "I remember you."

_Cas?  Please, man.  Please let it be you._

He turned.  "I remember everything."

_Shit._

"What I did... what I became.  Why didn't you tell me?" he demanded.

Dean had been spending the past 24 hours debating with himself about keeping Cas' history a secret, and getting to Sam without mishaps had always been the number one reason for doing it.  It was the easiest answer by far.  "Because Sam is dying in there," Dean provided.

"Because. Of. Me," Cas forced.   _No,_  Dean rattled in his head,  _because of whatever got inside you.  Because I didn't see the signs to stop you in time.  Because of everything_  but  _you._   "Everything... all these people.  I shouldn't be here."

Before Dean could tell it was happening, his breath escaped him as Cas was walking toward him.  Only he wasn't because then he was sliding between Dean and Meg, going past them, leaving.

"Cas.  Cas!" he shouted, reactively.  He couldn't stop him from walking away, Dean's greatest fear, but Cas was doing just that.  Dean pointed at Meg and jabbed, "You stay here.  CAS!"

He had to jog up the hill to catch up to the son of a bitch, all the while making himself hoarse with Cas' name in the hopes that it might eventually make him turn around.  But it didn't and he kept walking, even when Dean came up behind and said, "If you remember, then you know you did the best you could at the time."

"Don't defend me," he hissed.  "Do you have any idea the death toll in Heaven?  On Earth?"  It was only now that they'd reached the car that Cas halted and faced Dean.  His look was full of fury, remorse, frustration, heart-sickening sadness... all at once.  Dean would think all those emotions could never mix in one pot, except he'd seen them in the mirror.

"We didn't part friends, Dean."

He swallowed.  "So what?"

"I  _deserved_  to die."   _Oh Cas, no, don't say that.  You may have always questioned yourself, but please don't hate yourself.  Don't go down the road I'm on._   Cas' eyes shifted to different points on the ground, and Dean couldn't stand his uneasiness, his self-consciousness.  Shaking his head, Cas contended, "Now, I can't possibly fix it... so why did I even walk out of that river?"

_Cas, please, God.  I don't know what I'd do if you didn't.  Maybe you got out to keep me sane.  Maybe I needed you more than I thought.  Maybe you can make it right._ "Maybe  _to_  fix it," he delivered aloud.  Then he remembered it.  "Wait."

Pulling the key out of his pocket, Dean opened the trunk and reached into the back where it was stashed.  Where he'd put it in every car they'd driven to every town, keeping it safe for no reason other than his own neurosis.

But he'd known.  He'd been completely certain that he'd come back, and he'd need it.

He handed Cas the trenchcoat.

Cas took a slow breath in and out, like realization, and Dean wanted to know what the realization was.  What ticked in there, gave him feeling, made him sigh deeply?  When they first met, he had been Castiel, angel of the Lord, soldier of Heaven, until a turning point when he became Cas, Dean's friend, Heaven's revolutionary.   _Castiel_  would not have sighed like that.

His hands trembled, too.  Dean didn't know an angel's hands could, one that wasn't falling and becoming human.  Cas' eyes closed when his fingers grasped the fabric, so Dean kept holding on too, each of them keeping the other from dropping it.  They were standing close, and Dean could see Cas clenching his teeth, see the stubble on his tensing jaw... such human expressions.  Where did Cas learn them?

The answer was obvious.

The coat unfolded when he let go.  It unraveled so it was hanging in Cas' hands which took it by the lapels and slung it on.

Dean could smell it from here.  It smelled like algae and soil from where it had almost drowned along with its owner, the blood that hadn't completely come off in the water, gasoline from traveling in so many trunks, grease from Cas' favorite burgers, and for some reason, the smell of a crisp winter sun hitting the snow.

"I see that you expected me to return," Cas stated, as though it were a simple thing to say.

"You always do," Dean whispered back.

He brought his hands up to grip the collar, to pull Cas toward him, he still didn't know for what.  His body was practically acting of its own accord.  Dean put his arms around the angel's neck and rested his head on his shoulder, and shuddered.  It was an unspoken breaking of the dumb barriers they'd always kept before.

Cas hesitated a second longer, but finally brought his own arms up to wrap around Dean's back, fitting them together perfectly.  It was the most fulfilling thing Dean had ever been given.

This was Cas, hugging him back.  

Then he was pressing his hands in and Dean was squeezing, tightening and pulling closer and wishing they never had to let go.  They were holding each other together, and if they separated they'd fall to pieces.

"Cas..." Dean heard his own, broken voice.

The other head fell and rested against his, jaw-to-hair, and muttered, "Dean."

"Cas, man... why'd you do it?"   _No!  Why did you ask that?!  What're you thinking?!  You're going to ruin everything!_

He could feel Cas' throat swallow next to his ear.  "I-I... I deceived myself.  I cannot justify the reasons I gave."

"Sorry, I didn't mean to ask that," he retracted.  "I'm sorry."

"I am the one who should be sorry, Dean."

He pulled away.  Dean's brain begged to have the embrace again, but Cas was stepping back.  If it was what he needed, Dean would give it to him.

"I did everything for you, Dean, and I became a monster.  I never deserved you, no matter how much I did... because I never did the right thing."  He shook his head ashamedly with another sigh, gaze aimed at the dirt.  "I attempted to stand for your cause for free will, but I failed to... meet the standards."  With that last, he looked up at Dean,  _into_  Dean.  As though Dean  _embodied_ the standards.

"Cas, you blew the standards out of the water!" he disputed.  "Without you, we couldn't have saved the world - countless times - and me and Sam wouldn't be alive, and heaven would still be corrupt and... Cas, I'm sorry we didn't help you when you asked, and I'm sorry things happened the way they did, and most of it... most of it was my fault, okay?"

Cas looked appalled.  "How can you say that, Dean?  I made all the wrong choices, it was  _you_  who were always the leader, the one who always knew what to do--"

Dean took a step closer, gently wrapping his fingers around Cas' upper arm.  "Stop it, Cas, shh," he pleaded.   _You never should have trusted me.  I didn't even know why you did... only maybe now I'm starting to get the reason._   "I never knew what the fuck I was doing, okay?  And I never knew what I was doing to you."  He hated the cheesiness of it, but honestly, he was staring into those blue eyes and finally noticing that they looked back with about as much longing as he felt.  

"Dean."

"Now I know, though.  And it wasn't your fault.  I forgive you."

_I need you_ , he was dying to say too, but knew he could never get the words to come out.  He tried to imbue it into his touch instead, pressing a hand to Cas' cheek and the other arm around his waist, pulling him in.

Cas shook and pulled away.  There was a glistening streak from the corner of his eye to his mouth that Dean had the sudden urge to wipe away, but they were too far apart.  Cas' voice trembled, the first time Dean had ever heard it do so, as he spoke, "You can't mean that.  I don't deserve to-- No, Dean.  You don't believe that.  How could it not be my fault?!"

"Cas," he whispered hoarsely.

"You don't want me.  Trust me, you don't."

Cas turned and walked away, into the hospital toward Sam, dirty old trenchcoat only a reminder of the blood, the wrongs.  Dean wished he'd had the willpower to clean it.  But it would have meant forgiving Cas earlier.

///\\\\\

"What the hell do you mean you  _can't?"_

"I mean there's nothing left to rebuild."

_No.  Not after all this._ "Why not?" he clamored for a solution.

"Because it crumbled.  The pieces got crushed to dust by whatever's happening inside his head right now."

The sorrow in Cas' voice was profound.

Dean took a step back, leaned against the wall because he  _needed_  it for support.  "So you're saying there's nothing?  That he's gonna be like this until his candle blows out?"

Cas wasn't looking at him.  "I'm sorry," he sighed.  "This isn't a problem I can make disappear.  You know that."

Sammy was lying on the hospital bed, staring in the opposite direction at nobody in a chair that Dean knew was occupied in his head.  And he wasn't even responding to the outside world anymore, he was completely gone, he wasn't Sammy anymore.  And he'd never be Sammy again.  Dean physically  _could not_ live with that.

He would have announced his death wish right then and there were it not for the sudden expression on Cas' face - his lips parted as he inhaled, he straightened up, his eyes widened.  His voice was determined when he offered, "But I may be able to shift it."

"Shif--?"

"Yeah, it would get Sam back on his feet."  Cas was moving across the room, and Dean didn't have the faintest clue what he was going to do, how he was going to do it.  The angel sat down on the edge of Sam's bed, slanted still toward Dean.  "It's better this way..." he turned to Sam, "I'll be fine."

And that set off the fire alarm in Dean's brain.   _No, you're never fine._ "Wait, Cas, what are you doing?" he insisted. _This plan, whatever it is, is sure not gonna end well._

Cas ignored him, addressing his brother, "Now, Sam, this may hurt.  And if I can't tell you again," he breathed weightily, "I'm sorry I ever did this to you."

_This can't be good_.

Cas put his left hand on Sam's forehead and instantly this red, glowing... stuff exploded around Sam's eyes.  Dean checked the window, making sure no nurses could see something funky was going on, all the while he was internally screaming,  _WHAT IS CAS DOING?!_

The energy that was transferring lit up the veins in Cas' arm, stretching up until it reached his own eyes which started pulsing red as well.  They sucked up everything, until it was gone.

Sam gasped for air like a surfacing diver and Dean practically  _prayed_  the name, "Sam?"

"Dean!"

He full-on ran to his brother's side.  "Sam!"

He was sitting up.  He had stopped drooling.   _He is sitting up and breathing and oh thank God-- no, thank_  Cas.

"Cas?  Cas, is that you?" Sammy was asking.  He was talking.  He could talk.

But Cas was rocking back and forth.  He looked at Sam and the most horrified look grew across his face... and he was clearly seeing someone else.  He gasped and stood and backed up against the wall and stared and it was the second scariest thing Dean had ever seen.  The first was Sam, two minutes ago.

The Winchesters turned heads simultaneously, exchanging dumbfounded looks.

Then they took in Cas again.  He was breathing heavily, he was pushing himself toward the corner, and Dean didn't have a clue what to do.

Meg barged in.

"Hey boys, you wanna hur--"  She spotted Cas in the corner and something dark that Dean didn't have the capacity to label flashed across her face.  "What'd he do?"

Dean and Sam were still speechless, still making sure the other was alright, still not certain what just happened.

At their gaping expressions, she stopped expecting them to answer and approached Cas herself, wrapping her fingers around his elbow.  "Castiel?  What did you do?  Hey, what happened?"

That was when he crumpled to the floor, knees folded up, body shaking.

Dean watched as Meg fell to her knees and started petting Cas' forehead, checking his temperature then measuring his pulse on his wrist.  Sam whispered,  _"Is that Meg?"_  but it barely registered while she was tending Cas.  She put one of his arms over her shoulder and half-dragged him to the bed which Sam hurriedly cleared when he saw what she was doing.  Cas fell onto it and curled himself into a trembling ball, then suddenly stilled.

Dean's eyes were burning, but he couldn't-- not here, not now.  Not in front of Meg.

Inhaling a sharp breath, Sam muttered, "What  _did_  he do?"

"By the looks of it, he took all your little broken bits of soul and tacky glued them to his grace.  Nice job keeping the angel safe, Dean, you'll be lucky if he  _ever_  wakes up."

_Cas._    _No._

He gulped.  "What can we do?"

"Nothing, genius," she spat.  "You didn't know how to cure Sam, what makes you think you can cure  _him_  now?"

He cleared his throat.  This... it' couldn't... he couldn't...  _Cas, why'd you do that?  Why didn't I stop you?!_ But then he stopped himself from thinking that because Sam was better, Sam was alive.  Cas was an angel and wouldn't die from lack of sleep or food, he'd survive... but he'd still be tortured.  Dean didn't know which was worse.

"Just... okay, but..."   _Dammit, where is all this phlegm coming from--_  "What can we... how can we keep him safe?"

Sam gave him The Puppy Dog Look.  "Dean, he just saved my life--"

"I know that, Sammy!  Goddammit, he took all your broken marbles, he is  _not_  gonna be okay.  That's why we gotta keep him safe.  We gotta... we gotta  _do_  something!"  He hadn't realized he was shouting.  The painful swelling in his chest was making it difficult to breathe and he wanted nothing more than to kill some evil suckers and magically make Cas better.  He was stuck, unable to find answers, to take any action.  There was  _nothing_  he could do, like Meg said, and  _how could things possibly get worse?_

_Sammy's better._ He reminded himself, again and again.   _Sammy's better._

"I'll stay and keep an eye on him."

Both Dean and Sam turned to Meg with stunned expressions, not-so-astounded to hear those words from a demon and immediately theorizing on her ulterior motives.

"Hey, I'm not plotting."  She knew the look, the suspicion, that particular gear setting of every hunter's brain.  "He got all the other demons, the place is clean, he could stay here and lie low.  It's not like you two can quit your day job, so I'll be the one to stick around and change his diapers, kay?"

"No, absolutely not," Dean automatically refused.  "I do  _not_  trust you with him, let alone when he's--"

"When he's what?  Helpless?  It's okay, Dean, despite his cranky family, I actually kinda like this one, and we got somethin' in common.  So why don't you trust me on this for once and go back to kicking Dick and Crowley in the soft spots, kay?"

He hated Meg.  Especially when she had a point.

They needed to do their job, save the world one more friggin' time.  And having Cas with them would be the worst possible option, they'd never be able to keep him completely safe.  But neither could they be sure that they could trust Meg to be his caretaker...

And all this time Cas was lying on the hospital bed completely still, eyes wide, no one paying him attention while they argued.  Well, Dean and Meg argued, Sam seemed to be slipping into sleep standing up.

Dean took Cas in while he could, knowing he was going to go with Meg's plan and regret it.

"You think you can keep him here?  Protect him if you have to?"

Sam lifted his sagging head, eyes opening as far as they would, muttering, "Dean..."

"It's okay, Sammy.  She... helped us out.  It's her fault if she wants to keep doin' it."

His brother's eyebrows seemed concerned, but the rest of him was too tired.  He rubbed his face and sank his head back down.

"I want us to be friends, and friends help each other," Meg answered.  "I keep angel cakes nice and cozy while you boys take care of the rest of the world, and we can all stay in touch like one big, happy fam--"

"You are the  _last_  thing I'd call family," Dean hissed, viciously stabbing a finger toward her.

She shook her head, huffed, and looked away.  "Alright, then think about Castiel."

"That's what I'm doin'."

_Don't you dare say--_ "You sure about that?"

_Maybe_ , he thought.   _I hope._ There wasn't much left to hope  _for_  though, was there?  Anyway, he'd already decided Cas had to stay.  And what else could he do but make do?  That was all they ever did.

"He can stay, you can watch him.  If something happens, I completely blame you."   _Yeah, like I can avoid blaming myself.  I'm the one leaving him.  Again._

Her eyebrow perked up.  "Sometimes you surprise me, Dean."

"Yeah, me too," he mumbled as he took Sam's arm over his shoulder and walked out the door to the ward.

They had to get a stretcher for Cas and move him to a different bed so that Sam could sleep while they made arrangements for Cas to stay and Sam to leave.  Meg waited outside because her plan was to submit a recommended application to be a nurse there and would have to wait until morning.  Dean was rubbing his own eyes by the end of the night, but he finally got to walk out of there with his brother and that was all he could let himself want right then.

Sam wasn't helping.  "I don't know, I mean, we can't just leave him."

"Well, we can't bring him with us," Dean reasoned, "Everything on the planet's out for us, okay?  Word gets out, we can't protect him.  Not really.  This is safer.  Every demon who knows about Cas is dead."  ...  _Except one._

"Not everyone," Sam pointed out oh-so-auspiciously.   _Yeah, well, Meg's a bitch who doesn't count._   "Look, Dean, this whole 'enemy of my enemy is my friend' thing feels kind of like a demon deal."

He couldn't let Sam's logic break his determination, so he argued, "It's not a deal.  It's--"

"It's what?"

"Mutually assured destruction."   _Dick's gonna eat us all in the end, anyway_ , came the pessimistic jab in his brain.  "Look, man, I get it.  She's not our friend.  We don't even have friends.  All our friends are dead."

It was that kind of day.

///\\\\\

Losing Cas the second time was far, far worse.

This time he knew that Cas was alive, knew where he was, had every reassurance that he'd be safe... but he also knew that his head had become a crazy train with one passenger: Lucifer.  Cas had a new sign saying "Closed for Emotional Contact Indefinitely."  It was one thing to hope that Cas would somehow come back, and another entirely to hope that he could recover from this.

Dean's wish came true when Cas came back and now it was over, that one hope lost.  Now there was nothing to look forward to, and Dean knew how totally screwed that made him.  Because if he was totally honest with himself - for the first time in a very, very long time - he was in love with Cas.

And now he could never have him.


End file.
